Wifi hotspot/tethering suddenly will not connect to the internet

[Sarah Em]

I'm hoping somebody here will have soms suggestions for me:

I've had a Galaxy Tab for 2 years, and used it, very successfully, as a wifi hotspot from May until July this year, when my laptop was suddenly not able to connect to the internet via the hotspot. It connected just fine to the Tab, and has no problems on my home wifi. The Tab was still able to connect to the internet normally, with no apparent problems.

I fiddled about a bit and thought perhaps it was a hardware problem, so bought a seconhand Nexus S. That has been working fine until yesterday, when the exact same thing has happened - the laptop can connect fine to the Nexus, but says there is no internet connection. The Nexus itself is connecting just fine.

I'm in the UK - my carrier is Three (Hutchinson).

Any ideas?

---
Sarah

 

[IncredibleDrone]

Its sounds like your provider maybe causing this. Do you have the mobile hot spot feature or do you have your device rooted for this function. I would try contacting your provider and see if they have any suggestions. It doesn't seem to be any of your devices. Many providers have started to throttle heavy data users that dont pay for all the features. The carriers can tell when you are tethering and they can see if you pay for mobile hot spots.

 

[Sarah Em]

Replying to myself, in case someone else has the same issue...

When I tried to use the laptop at home, I found it would not connect to the wireless network there either, or even directly with an ethernet cable. I googled for the issue, and found that a number of people have had the same problem, going back several years (not just Windows 7). I tried a number of the suggested solutions, including removing device drivers and resetting the TCP/IP stack and the DNS; none worked. I finally resorted to a factory restore, which cured all network problems, including hotspot usage (though there is still a fault on my tablet).

So the error was in the network drivers on the laptop.

 

[Shadowriver]

Odp: Wifi hotspot/tethering suddenly will not connect to the internet

Provider cant block software features or else there is there software controling it, tethering is no diffrent from standard network routing which your router do and under NAT its not visible to provider (they can only see that by monitoring your network activity, for example you trying to connect to windows update server which android device would not do that). So Tethering is not there feature its a phone feature (if somebody tell you other wise they BSing you) and technicly should work whatever carrier think about it.